As the years have passed, Brookford has worked to carefully listen and respond to customer feedback. As I was signing up for my own summer share recently, I was thinking about how cool it is that families can pick and choose from such a huge variety of options to develop a local and seasonal eating plan that fits their lifestyle. In hosting a pickup site over the past few years, I’ve found that customers don’t take advantage of this option as much as I would expect, so I thought it might be helpful to spend a minute breaking it down.

The way it works is this: each customer must choose at least one base share. You are not limited to one base share, you simply need to order a minimum of one base share in order to participate in the CSA.

Available base shares are:

Whole Diet Base Share: Every week (for the five months of the session) you will receive 3 dairy items of your choosing, 1 dozen eggs, 1 loaf of bread, and a large box of organic vegetables. Each month (for the five months of the session) you will receive approximately 6 pounds of pork, 6 pounds of beef, and 2 broilers.

Meat Base Share: Every month for five months, you will receive approximately 6 pounds of pork, 6 pounds of beef, and 2 broilers.

Vegetable Base Share: Every week for five months, you will receive a large box (full veggie base share) or 1 small box (half veggie base share) of organic vegetables.

After choosing at least one base share, you have the option of adding on as many add-on shares as you would like. This is optional. You can pick and choose what you want to include.

Available add-on shares are:

Beef - approx. 6lbs/month for 5 months

Pork - approx. 6lbs/month for 5 months

Eggs - one dozen per week

Bread - one loaf per week

Peak season veggies - A half-veggie share for the last twelve weeks of the session

Let’s take a look at the wide variety of shares that various customers might order, as a way of highlighting how easy it is to adapt the CSA to your particular eating habits.

Household 1:

This is a family of six with no dietary restrictions. They eat a lot of vegetables, do not have a garden, and prefer to source as much food as possible from local sources. They decide to purchase:

1 base whole diet share

1 add-on dairy share

1 add-on bread share

1 add-on pork share

Household 2:

This is a two adult household with no children that follows a paleo diet. They decide to purchase:

1 base half veggie share

1 base meat share

1 add-on egg shares

Household 3:

This is a vegetarian family of four that consumes eggs and dairy. They decide to purchase:

1 base full veggie share

2 add-on egg shares

1 add-on dairy share

1 add-on bread share

Whether your household is big or small, vegetarian, paleo, just big eaters in general, vegan, gourmet, or gluten-free, there is a share combination that can make it easy (and delicious!) to feed your family local, seasonal food. Have fun mixing and matching to come up with the perfect fit for your lifestyle! The summer session starts June 6th - be sure to sign up soon: http://www.brookfordfarm.com/register/.